Rio 2016 announced during last month’s Olympic Games that ticket sales for the Paralympics were languishing at 12 per cent, prompting a desperate late push to attract interest.

Interest eventually began to pick up with prices slashed and local children invited to attend, and although organisers have failed to hit their target of 2.5 million ticket sales, the two million sold to date still makes Rio 2016 the second most successful Paralympic Games behind London 2012.

When asked, however, whether in hindsight the Organising Committee would have addressed the situation earlier, Andrada said "we don’t regret anything".

He added: "We’re just about to end a magic journey where we’ve learned a lot, delivered all the promises and generated the good energy that we would expect, so there is no regrets.

"The beginning of the sales was compromised quite a bit by the prices and quite a bit by the fact that there were Olympic tickets available, and people had no knowledge that they could have a lot of energy and fun and good sport in the Paralympics, despite the fact that we tried a lot with publicity and things.

"I believe that to sell two million tickets is a fantastic feat and we can only thank the Brazilian people who got the energy right.

"It’s important that we show every day a little bit more and since the Games started, we have sold about the same as we were selling for the Olympic Games.

"People were not comparing Games - they came here because they wanted to see the athletes competing here, the Paralympic athletes and everything."

Andrada continued: "I wouldn’t talk about regret.

"Maybe if we had experience of one or two Games we would have had more assurance that the sales would pick up at the end, but at the time we had to make executive decisions on determining the size of the Games and I believe we took the right decisions."

The ticket sale drive was helped by crowdfunding campaign #FillTheSeats, which was launched late last month by former London 2012 marketing director Greg Nugent.

More than 15,000 Brazilian youngsters are due to attend the Paralympics here after the campaign raised nearly $450,000 (£340,000/€400,000).

#FillTheSeats officially began with donations from American wheelchair racer Tatyana McFadden, a multiple Paralympic Games gold medallist, and sister Hannah.

It then received the support of British pop-rock band Coldplay, who performed at the Closing Ceremony of the London 2012 Paralympics.

Earlier this month, Rio 2016 and the Rio de Janeiro State Government partnered to provide Paralympic tickets to 33,000 local teenagers.

The initiative has been organised through the Rio 2016 education programme, Transforma, who were tasked with promoting the Olympic and Paralympic values to seven million young people in Brazil.

They have attempted to promote Olympic and Paralympic sports in more than 12,000 schools, through a series of sports festivals.